Great Li Martial God

On the winding stone-paved path, a pair of thick-soled copper-studded court boots rose and fell in rapid succession, the urgent sound of footsteps echoing between the surrounding halls and buildings and breaking the stillness of the Tianjin Guards headquarters.

The Third Prince, Li Zhu, clad in a plain white satin robe with a black hemp belt at his waist, followed the Tianjin Guards escort ahead of him with a dark expression, striding quickly without a word.

Before long, the Tianjin Guards escort stopped in front of a courtyard, turned back with a careful glance at Li Zhu’s unpleasant expression, and reported, ”Your Highness, this is where the Eighth Prince resides.”

Hearing this, the powerfully built Third Prince Li Zhu gave a wave of his hand, not even bothering to look at the man, and said, ”You can get lost.”

The escort did not dare linger and retreated at once, while Li Zhu pushed open the half-latched courtyard gate and walked straight inside.

Entering the courtyard, Li Zhu swept his fierce gaze around, his eyes eventually settling on a pavilion in the yard.

There, a young man with refined and handsome features, dressed in a dark robe, was seated on a stone stool with a porcelain cup in hand, leisurely sipping tea. Beside him stood a beautiful woman in robes as white as snow.

As Li Zhu entered, the woman of elegant and lovely appearance cast a glance in his direction, while the young man simply continued drinking his tea without a care.

”You’re the son of Consort Jing?”

Li Zhu’s gaze settled on Li Musheng, who was drinking tea, and he asked in an icy tone.Li Musheng said nothing and paid him no attention. Cang Yinyue beside him turned to Li Zhu and said, ”The Tianjin Guards have more pressing matters to attend to at this time and are unable to assist in apprehending the killer of Imperial Consort Ji. We ask that the Third Prince please take his leave.”

The moment those words landed, the anger Li Zhu had been suppressing could no longer be contained, and his voice turned frigid as he said, ”Does a lowly servant girl like you have any standing to speak here?”

As he said this, a ruthless look crossed his face, and he quietly circulated the True Qi within his body as he began walking slowly toward Li Musheng and Cang Yinyue.

With every step he took, his aura grew stronger and more imposing, and a flow of purple-gold light surged within his eyes.

In Li Zhu’s estimation, this so-called Eighth Prince before him who had grown up among the common people was simply ignorant of the heights of heaven.

To defy him without any backing whatsoever, and at the very moment when his Imperial Mother had just died and he needed the Tianjin Guards to hunt down her killer, was utterly intolerable.

The resentment and fury from being unable to find the true culprit behind his Imperial Mother’s death, along with the murderous hatred he bore toward that killer, all surged up in his heart at this moment.

”Ignorant, arrogant, and utterly disrespectful. Today I will discipline you on our Imperial Father’s behalf and give you something to remember. Shangyang City is not some remote backwater, and this is not a place where you can run wild.”

Li Zhu declared in a sharp voice, his gaze fixed directly on Li Musheng.

The more furious he felt inwardly, the more composed his expression paradoxically became.

As he advanced, both of his hands gave rise to streams of purple and gold martial True Qi respectively, coiling around his arms like two writhing flood dragons.

The next moment, Li Zhu thrust both arms outward. The surging True Qi let out a low, resonant roar as it reached across the air toward Li Musheng in the pavilion in a grasping strike.

Seeing this, Li Musheng raised an eyebrow slightly. He could not be bothered to make a move himself, and simply exchanged a glance with Cang Yinyue.

Cang Yinyue hesitated for a moment, but in the end drew her sword in time. The Imperial Dragon Divine Sword traced an arc of cyan sword light and swept horizontally toward the oncoming Li Zhu.

Cang Yinyue knew how formidable the Imperial Dragon Divine Sword was, so she held back on this strike.

After all, Li Zhu was the Third Prince of Great Li no matter what, and she had no wish to truly injure him and bring trouble down on Li Musheng as a result.

Yet she had still underestimated the ferocious power of the Imperial Dragon Divine Sword as Great Li’s national divine artifact. When the strike landed, its force far exceeded her expectations.

The sword light emanating from the Imperial Dragon Divine Sword not only extinguished the purple-gold martial True Qi Li Zhu had unleashed in an instant, but the residual sword light swept directly across both of Li Zhu’s arms, breaking through the True Qi defense on the surface of his body and cutting open a gash several inches long.

Li Zhu stopped his advance abruptly and looked down in shock.

There on both his arms was a sword wound so deep the bone was nearly visible, and bright crimson blood was seeping steadily from within, staining half a sleeve of white fabric red in no time at all.

”You dare wound me, you lowly servant?”

A flash of shocked fury crossed Li Zhu’s eyes, and he raised his head to look at Cang Yinyue with a cold, murderous expression, then snapped his teeth together and spoke into the air, saying, ”Kill her!”

The next instant, from some hidden corner outside the courtyard, a black-robed elder who had been concealing his presence suddenly moved, and in the blink of an eye appeared before Li Zhu.

The elder took one look at the wounds on Li Zhu’s arms, then without the slightest hesitation released a bone-chilling killing intent from his entire body, reached out, and drove a clawed strike of dark, icy shadow energy toward Cang Yinyue opposite.

But in the very next moment, the shadow claw had barely reached mid-air when the black-robed elder’s entire body came to a sudden halt, becoming utterly motionless.

Li Zhu behind him furrowed his brow at the sight and was about to speak.

But when his gaze fell on the black-robed elder, his pupils suddenly constricted, for he saw that at the back of the man’s head, a blood-soaked hole had appeared at some point, passing cleanly through from back to front.

Li Zhu, whose heart had been seething with resentment and killing intent just moments before, felt as though a bucket of cold water had been poured over him. He spun around and looked frantically in every direction, crying out in alarm, ”Who did this?”

At that moment, Li Musheng’s voice drifted over slowly from beneath the pavilion, saying, ”Naturally, it was me.”

Hearing this, Li Zhu turned to look at Li Musheng, then shook his head heavily and said in a low, stern voice, ”Impossible.”

”You’re bluffing. You must have a powerful expert hidden nearby. This man was sent from the palace, and killing him is not something the palace will let pass easily. Whoever is behind you is as good as dead.”

At this point Li Zhu’s expression was dark and unpleasant. He had come to the Tianjin Guards headquarters fully confident that no one here would dare lay a hand on him.

Yet Li Musheng had been so thoroughly unreasonable, not only letting a lowly servant girl wound him but even having someone kill the expert the palace had sent to guard him in secret. It was simply lawless and outrageous.

At this moment, Li Musheng glanced at Li Zhu and said, ”There is nothing impossible about it. I even went into the palace and killed that Imperial Mother of yours. Killing him was simple by comparison.”

The moment those words fell, Li Zhu froze entirely, then snapped his head toward Li Musheng with a savage fury blazing in his eyes, roaring, ”You’re courting death!”

He naturally did not believe Li Musheng had the ability to kill his Imperial Mother, but the arrogant claim concerning his deceased mother filled him with a rage so violent he would have liked nothing more than to tear the man apart piece by piece.

Even so, considering the situation before him, Li Zhu had no choice but to temporarily suppress the killing intent in his heart and refrain from rash action.

Just then, Cang Yinyue suddenly looked toward Li Zhu and said, ”Third Prince, are you aware that Imperial Consort Ji colluded with the Cangyuan Marquis household to abduct young women and kill them for use in her cultivation?”

The moment she said this, Li Zhu’s expression, which had been seething with fury, changed abruptly, and he turned to face Cang Yinyue, saying, ”How do you know about this?”

Cang Yinyue’s eyes narrowed slightly, saying, ”Imperial Consort Ji was someone who deserved to die. I advise you to let this matter rest. Once it spreads, she will not even be able to rest in peace in death.”

Li Zhu’s expression immediately turned cold and sharp, and he said in a hard voice, ”What does killing a few people for cultivation matter? Who are you, a lowly servant, to tell me what to do? Both of you, wait for what’s coming. I will make you pay for today.”

With that, Li Zhu staunched the wound on his arm while turning to leave without so much as a glance at the black-robed elder’s corpse on the ground, heading straight for the courtyard exit.

Li Musheng not only had a formidable hidden expert behind him, but the servant girl before him was no easy opponent either. He was in no position to handle them alone.

The only thing to do for now was to swallow his humiliation and withdraw temporarily, then go back and seek the help of his Second Brother and maternal grandfather.

A prince with no backing whatsoever, just a useless piece of trash, that was all. He had countless means at his disposal to make the man pay back this humiliation a hundredfold.

Just at that moment, Li Musheng, still seated beneath the pavilion drinking his tea, glanced at Cang Yinyue and said, ”Miss Cang, with a person like this, there’s really no point placing too much hope in them. Those who should be killed are killed. Those with some value are killed after their value has been squeezed dry.”

As the words left his mouth, a streak of talisman light quietly entered the body of Li Zhu, who was just about to depart.

Li Zhu had not even had time to react before the Life and Death Talisman within him activated, and a torment like ten thousand ants gnawing through his flesh and boring into his very bones descended upon him, sending him writhing and rolling on the ground in agony, screaming uncontrollably.

At this point Li Musheng spoke calmly to Cang Yinyue, saying, ”I have set it so he dies after half an incense stick’s worth of time. This fellow is closely connected to the Second Prince, so question him about anything regarding the Tianqi Secret Treasury keys. Of course, if nothing comes of it, that’s fine too.”

Hearing this, Cang Yinyue drew a deep breath. While she did not feel that killing Li Zhu was entirely the right thing to do, things had come to this point, and allowing Li Zhu to leave alive left no telling what manner of retaliation might follow.

So it was better to be done with him.

Afterward she would handle the body and deny everything, and perhaps the matter could be smoothed over.

With that thought, Cang Yinyue nodded. Having served in both the Hidden Intelligence Bureau and Six Doors, she naturally had considerable expertise in disposing of bodies, and could ensure that not a single trace would be left behind.

But just then, Li Musheng spoke up, saying, ”Miss Cang, remember to leave him an intact corpse. We are, after all, distantly related in some fashion, so at the very least there should be no one saying I lack basic human decency.”

Hearing this, Cang Yinyue furrowed her brow slightly.

Even so, since Li Musheng had made the request, she did not refuse it. Troublesome as it was, she would do her best to find a way to resolve the matter cleanly.

About half an incense stick’s worth of time later, Cang Yinyue glanced at Li Zhu’s corpse on the ground, then relayed the results of the interrogation to Li Musheng.

Having already known that one of the Tianqi Secret Treasury keys was in the Second Prince’s hands, Cang Yinyue had not held particularly high hopes of getting anything useful out of Li Zhu.

But what came as something of a surprise was that according to Li Zhu, after the Second Prince Li Que had come into possession of one key, he had also been covertly searching for the other keys to the Tianqi Secret Treasury, and it appeared he had actually made some headway.

”According to Li Zhu, the other key remaining in Shangyang City should be in the hands of the fake prince currently held in the heavenly prison.”

Cang Yinyue looked toward Li Musheng with a thoughtful expression, saying slowly, ”However, those Great Qi remnants earlier mentioned that the holder of the other key is a woman, and that she is a member of the Great Li imperial family.”

”If neither party was lying, combining both accounts together, the remaining Tianqi Secret Treasury key very likely ended up in the hands of the Eldest Princess, who shares a close connection with the fake prince.”

Hearing this, Li Musheng glanced at Cang Yinyue. He had to admit that the way this young woman’s mind worked was quite interesting at times.

That said, Cang Yinyue’s line of reasoning was not unreasonable, and if it held up, it did at least narrow down the search.

”I’ll leave this matter in Miss Cang’s hands to investigate. That said, the Eldest Princess appears to be no slouch in terms of martial Dao cultivation, and has formidable experts protecting her. If it cannot be done, wait for my return before proceeding.”

Li Musheng offered her this word of caution, and Cang Yinyue gave a nod, saying, ”Your Highness may rest easy. I know my limits.”

Then she turned to prepare to deal with Li Zhu’s body.

However, Li Musheng saw this and stretched out a hand to stop her, saying, ”Leave that to the Tianjin Guards to handle. After all, I’m doing this partly for their Commander’s sake, so they should at least pull their weight and take care of the loose ends.”

With that, Li Musheng called back the Tianjin Guards escort he had dismissed earlier and had him take care of Li Zhu’s body.

Since he had said he would leave Li Zhu an intact corpse, he naturally followed through on his word. It was not a matter of any great consequence.

However, when the recalled Tianjin Guards escort laid eyes on Li Zhu’s corpse lying on the courtyard floor, he stood rooted to the spot as though struck by lightning, stunned and unable to move for a long moment.

Snapping back to his senses, the Tianjin Guards escort, Zeng Hai, felt the hair on his scalp stand on end, and a wave after wave of cold sweat broke out across his back until it had soaked through his clothing entirely.

”Your... Your Highness, you’re telling me to deal with the Third Prince’s corpse?”

Zeng Hai stared at Li Musheng with hollow eyes, his words chattering out between trembling teeth.

The senior officers above him had assigned him as an escort for the Eighth Prince, a plum posting that the other Tianjin Guards members could only envy.

After all, the man was of noble status, and if he happened to catch the Eighth Prince’s favor, setting aside any staggering windfall, promotion and a salary increase would only be a matter of time.

But the scene before him now had very nearly frightened him into fainting on the spot.

What was he seeing?

The Third Prince, that tall, vigorous figure who had been so very much alive just moments ago, was now simply dead, nothing left but a cold corpse lying in the courtyard.

And the Eighth Prince before him was now telling him to handle the body.

At this moment, Zeng Hai could no longer see any future in which he received a promotion and a raise. All he could see was that his own days were numbered, his fate sealed.

...

Before long, Zeng Hai, his mind a complete blank, staggered out of Li Musheng’s courtyard with Li Zhu’s body on his back, not knowing quite what he was doing.

After putting some distance between himself and the courtyard, he wiped the cold sweat from his brow, glanced back at the courtyard behind him, and then his entire body went limp as he collapsed and sat down on the ground.

Li Musheng had told him to handle the body, and refusing was simply not an option. Otherwise there was a real chance that one corpse would become two, and the extra one would undoubtedly be his.

”No, this is absolutely beyond my ability to handle. I have to inform Commissioner Yu...”

Zeng Hai shook his head vigorously, but very quickly began to hesitate again.

A prince had just died. Could a mere Suppression Commissioner resolve a problem of this magnitude?

For a moment he sat on the ground with his expression shifting through a succession of unpleasant variations.

In the end, he hauled himself up from the ground, carried Li Zhu’s body to a discreet location and hid it there.

Then, without pausing his steps, he ran as fast as he could toward the hall where Commander Fu Qiwen was stationed.

At first, when Zeng Hai entered and began making his report, Fu Qiwen did not even look up from the documents he was writing through rapidly, assuming it was just some routine matter concerning affairs within the Tianjin Guards headquarters.

But as Zeng Hai stumbled his way through the account of what had happened with Li Zhu, Fu Qiwen, who had been bent over his desk writing at speed, visibly froze for a single breath, and then shot to his feet, staring at Zeng Hai with an expression of utter shock.

”What did you just say?”